Carbon Monoxide!?

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Weird. The smoke alarm went off, not incredibly odd when I am using the fireplace, but it wasn't the smoke detector. It was the CO alarm. I was totally surprised. It had never gone off as long as I have had one, over many many years. Yep, after resetting it a few times. It was getting a reading over 200 ppm CO. When I took it downstairs I got a reading near 300 ppm. I started getting light headed at this point. After thinking maybe the furnace heat exchanger failed and puzzling around a bit I figured out what happened. As part of the huge winter storm that recently covered almost half of the US, we lost our electricity. So, being well prepared, I rolled out the generator and started doing what I normally do. The generator (although it was completely outside) was creating CO to get in the house. Using the fireplace draft (and possibly other leaks) the whole house created a vacuum around the seal of the basement garage door. After the CO got into the house the forced air heat...
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I am back home in Duluth. I spent the last week making my way to central Finland and back again. It is time to spend time on the house and catching up. I finally plugged in the TV. I haven't missed it since I moved.

We had some productive meetings in England and Finland. We had time for a few laughs as well. It is always enlightening when I travel and spend time with folks from other cultures.

One of my colleagues from England just got back from Kiev. He brought back an informative brochure about an exciting tour opportunity of the Chernobyl power plant. Let's call it "Atomic Disaster Tourism" for now. I had to admit that I would like to go on the tour.

I think "Cramo" is a good brand name for temporary offices. My domestic flight in Finland was on an ATR-72 combo-freighter. There were 5 other passengers. There were 4 in the air crew and 4 on the ground. Jyvaskyla Finland has DIY security. I like Finland. They seem so normal until you get to know them. Let's not forget that Linus Torvalds is Finnish.











Comments

David said…
Since I don't know any Fin better: what happens once you get to know them better?? :)
8:05 AM
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Carbon Monoxide!?

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Image
Weird. The smoke alarm went off, not incredibly odd when I am using the fireplace, but it wasn't the smoke detector. It was the CO alarm. I was totally surprised. It had never gone off as long as I have had one, over many many years. Yep, after resetting it a few times. It was getting a reading over 200 ppm CO. When I took it downstairs I got a reading near 300 ppm. I started getting light headed at this point. After thinking maybe the furnace heat exchanger failed and puzzling around a bit I figured out what happened. As part of the huge winter storm that recently covered almost half of the US, we lost our electricity. So, being well prepared, I rolled out the generator and started doing what I normally do. The generator (although it was completely outside) was creating CO to get in the house. Using the fireplace draft (and possibly other leaks) the whole house created a vacuum around the seal of the basement garage door. After the CO got into the house the forced air heat...
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